5 African startups joins the Y Combinator W22 batch

Five more African startups have been confirmed as participants in the renowned Silicon Valley-based Y Combinator accelerator’s W22 batch, bringing the total to 15.

The W22 batch of the Y Combinator program is currently in session, and will conclude with a demo day in March, having played a role in the early days of companies such as Airbnb, Coinbase, and Dropbox, among others.

At a demo day, participants receive seed funding as well as additional investment opportunities. The accelerator’s S21 edition had 15 African participants, the most ever, and Disrupt Africa recently reported on the first 10 confirmed African participants in the W22 batch.

With over 230 companies now confirmed to participate, a further five African names have been added to the list, bringing the total number of African names announced to 15, matching the number of African participants in S21. More W22 participants are expected to be revealed in the coming months, both before and after demo day.

Four of the five new startups on the list are from Nigeria, which accounts for 11 of the 15 African participants thus far. They are Remedial Health, a pharma-focused health startup; Duplo, a fintech startup that works to digitize payment flows for B2B companies; Grey, formerly Aboki Africa, which provides foreign currency accounts for Africans; and Heyfood, a food ordering and delivery service for restaurants.

Boya, a Kenyan company, is the fifth. It enables businesses to instantly issue corporate cards to employees and provides them with software that gives them real-time control and visibility over all spending.

Continental royalty such as Flutterwave, Paystack, and Kobo360 are among the Y Combinator alumni (not to mention Cowrywise, MarketForce, Kudi, WaystoCap, WorkPay, Healthlane, Trella, 54gene, CredPal, NALA and Breadfast).

Disrupt Africa recently reported that the accelerator’s standard deal size had been raised to US$500,000. YC previously invested US$125,000 for 7% equity, but under its new standard deal, it will also invest an additional US$375,000 on an uncapped SAFE with “Most Favoured Nation” (MFN) terms.

The accelerator occupies an ambiguous position within the continent’s startup ecosystem, but entrepreneurs praise it for having a positive impact on their businesses.